Matthew Perez

The Communicator

Students at SFCC don’t have access to competitive debate, despite interest The term “debate” is often used to describe many kinds of arguments taking place in the public discourse , but what makes something a “debate” and what value does it hold for students?

“Debate is a formal contest of argumentation between two teams or individuals” says the international debate education association. Though SFCC doesn’t currently have a formal debate team, some students are engaging in debate “skirmishes” on Wednesdays in building 24.

“I would love to see debate club” said SFCC student Caroline Rhoads. Debate is a challenge and applies in places you wouldn’t expect said Rhoads.

SFCC has its club activities divided in to two categories on the school website, Associate Student clubs, and Instructionally Related Programs or IRP’s.

Rockford Radke , an IRP club representative, expressed n

support for a Debate Club. “It (debate) gives students real world application to business negations and politics…teaches students they can handle being wrong” said Radke.

“Debate teaches us to make compromises by seeing both sides of an argument” said Radke.

If there is value and interest in competitive debate, then what happened to the SFCC’s debate team? According to Debate Instructor Craig Rickett it was actually fairly complicated. Competitive debate is a skill that can only be learned through practice, competing in tournaments is a necessity, and most of the tournaments are on the Western side of the state said Rickett.

The budget for SFCC’s debate team was generous, just to compete the team would have to travel great distance most of the time, even with good funding it was difficult to keep the team competitive said Rickett. There doesn’t seem to be a lack of interest or value. “It’s a different experience because it allows you to come to conclusions through seeing both sides of the issue” said Andrew Van Hoff.